Men rattle their chains-to manifest their freedom.
What a blessing this smoking is! Perhaps the greatest that we owe to the discovery of America.
The worst use that can be made of success is to boast of it.
It is a weak thing to tell half your story, and then ask your friend’s advice-a still weaker thing to take it.
We are not so easily guided by our most prominent weaknesses as by those of which we are least aware.
There is hardly a more common error than that of taking the man who has one talent, for a genius.
It is better in some respects to be admired by those with whom you live than to be loved by them; and this not on account of any gratification of vanity, but because admiration is so much more tolerant than love.
Extremely foolish advice is likely to be uttered by those who are looking at the laboring vessel from the land.
We are pleased with one who instantly assents to our opinions, but we love a proselyte.
It has been said with some meaning that if men would but rest in silence, they might always hear the music of the spheres.
The world will tolerate many vices, but not their diminutives.
Offended vanity is the great separator in social life.
The measure of civilization in a people is to be found in its just appreciation of the wrongfulness of war.
Wisdom is seldom gained without suffering.
Men of much depth of mind can bear a great deal of counsel; for it does not easily deface their own character, nor render their purposes indistinct.
More than half the difficulties of the world would be allayed or removed by the exhibition of good temper.
He who is continually changing his point of view sees more, and more clearly, than one who, statue-like, forever stands upon the same pedestal; however lofty and well-placed that pedestal may be.
Any one who is much talked of be much maligned. This seems to be a harsh conclusion; but when you consider how much more given men are to depreciate than to appreciate, you will acknowledge that there is some truth in the saying.
We are frequently understood the least by those who have known us the longest.
Thoughts there are, not to be translated into any language, and spirits alone can read them.